1851 "880" $50 RE Augustus Humbert (Regular Strike)

This is the second generation of $50 "slugs" produced under the auspices of Augustus Humbert, who ran the U.S. Assay Office of gold in San Francisco, California. Unlike the various private firms producing their own ingots and coins during this period, the U.S. Assay Office was an officially sanctioned operation.

This "new and improved" version of the $50 slug eliminated some of the time-consuming operations involved with the production of the earliest versions. Most notably, the legends that had to be applied by hand to the edge faces in the first issues were now engraved into the face (obverse) die. This one improvement eliminated seven single steps in production. Also, the date (1851) and fineness (880) appeared in the die instead of having to be punched in by hand, eliminating two more steps. Reeding replaced the former edge lettering to prevent clipping or shaving.

Don Kagin assigned this version K-5 in his 1981 "Private Gold Coins and Patterns of the United States." Kagin listed this variety as Low R-5, representing approximately 75-100 survivors.

Because of their heavy weight, many of these coins have bruises or dents on the corners, thus they should all be examined carefully for evidence of repair. High grade examples are very rare, with only a few Uncirculated examples known. The finest known example is an amazing NGC MS65* sold by Bowers & Merena for a whopping $460,000 back in 2008.